Why would a person ever want to be vegan?
It's a surprise to many that a vegan diet can be nutritious, delicious, and helpful for the environment. Becoming a vegan has certainly gained popularity in recent years, and not without reason. To keep this intro succinct, let's hop right into the reasons as to why you should adopt a vegan diet:
To Reduce Your Greenhouse Emissions: Many leading environmental organizations ignore the problem of animal agriculture as a major factor of global warming. Animal agriculture is the raising of livestock for the animal product and recreational purposes. Animal agriculture, particularly the cattle industry, is a main contributor to the production of greenhouse gases. In fact, a 2006 United Nations Report stated that the animal agriculture industry emits more greenhouse gases than all of the cars and trucks in the world combined! Cows and sheep are responsible for 37% of the total methane produced by humans. When you eat a vegan diet, you cut out any economical support for this industry, reducing demand for their meat products among other pollution-heavy agricultural resources. By eating a vegan diet, therefore, you would PERSONALLY contribute to decreasing greenhouse gas emissions.
To Save Water: Not only does animal agriculture make a substantial impact on the amount of greenhouse gases emitted into our atmosphere, but the production of meat requires an abundant amount of water. For example, one pound of beef requires a staggering 1,799 gallons of water. This estimation is calculated by the amount of water needed for irrigation of the feed for the cattle, drinking water, and processing of the meat. When you also consider how meat is often shipped from place to place, you may factor in extra water consumption and pollution, as fuel for vehicles spews pollution. In addition to water use, animal agriculture also increases water pollution caused by runoff from factory farms. The manure from the animals flows into nearby rivers, lakes, and streams, leading to water pollution. This pollution can cause a considerable amount of damage to humans and aquatic animals.
To Reduce Deforestation: Thirty percent of the Earth’s entire land surface is used for animal farming. This land is used for grazing and for growing crops used for animal feed. In order for this land to be used for animal agriculture, rainforests must be cleared, resulting in extreme habitat loss. It is estimated that 80% of the world’s deforestation is caused by animal agriculture.
Many people are afraid of eating a vegan diet, because they fear that it will be too difficult or unhealthy. Visiting a dietician or nutritionist is always a good idea to make sure that you will maintain a healthy balance of proteins, calcium, and all of the vitamins you need. The nutritionist will most likely recommend certain supplements you could take in order for you to be a healthy vegan. If you continue to eat a balanced diet and taking supplements that your body needs, there are no health concerns associated with being a vegan. As to the difficulty of maintaining a vegan diet, there are many restaurants and grocery stores that cater to vegans. Mom’s Organic Market and Trader Joe’s, both of which have locations near Bryn Mawr, have extensive vegan sections and make grocery shopping much easier. There are also many restaurants in the Baltimore area that have menus catered to vegans. Some of these include Liquid Earth in Fells Point, Zoe’s Kitchen, Atwater's, and many more. If you are worried about finding vegan options at other restaurants that are not as “vegan friendly”, making vegan food in your own home is always an alternative. There are hundreds of amazing vegan cookbooks to choose from, which include recipes for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and even dessert! I also recommend following vegan social media pages and downloading vegan cooking apps, which provide recipes daily. Some of the best accounts to follow on Instagram for vegan inspiration include @bestofvegan, @veganfoodspot, and @easyveganrecipes. Lastly, an app that I have found very helpful when figuring out what I can and cannot eat is Vegan Pocket. This app allows you to scan barcodes on food products in order to quickly and easily know if the ingredients in that food are vegan or not. Of course, every product in the grocery store is not in their system, but if you come across a product not within the app, you can provide feedback regarding whether or not the food is vegan, therefore broadening the system.
Here are some extra resources regarding the vegan lifestyle and other information in this article:
Infographic that Nina Kolodgie, Katrina Salmon, and Natalie Bunce created for their biology project about the environmental impacts of animal agriculture
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